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The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

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Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#301

Post by machiaweliczny »

obayesshelton wrote: post #15

Crypto and NFT is one big ponzi scheme. Who on earth is spending $000,000s on a virtual ship? I sense it is a case of somebody close to the NFT or virtual world buying the asset and making out it is a great thing and then selling it on quickly. Many a scam involves somebody from the group buying something so the unwilling feel like it safe. As always, don't be left holding the baby.

Please learn about f2p business model and whale concept. Most f2p apps and many people behind them live from others paying $1M for some digital stuff.

I think it's not super healthy but as long it's taxed I guess it's fine but that shows wealth inequality.

Check "Genshin Impact" for prominient example.

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#302

Post by delabay »

meepmorp wrote: post #292
delabay wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crypto speaks to aspects of humanity which people hold near and dear. Crypto no doubt harbors shady characters, ponzi schemes, scams. You also can't deny that there are ideas which threaten state control, monetary policy, nationalistic ideals, religion its self. Just look at the magnitude of the conversation. Its easy to dismiss me as the ramblings of somebody caught up in the scam. But when has it been a good idea t…

> If you think in absolutes you can never accept new information. Never? Sounds a mite like absolute thinking.

More like a mathematical certainty

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#303

Post by gonehome »

BoorishBears wrote: post #281
gonehome wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “ That doesn't mean Enron was a sound company.” You’re right of course, my point was not that cynicism is always false, but that people are cynically dismissive about everything so it holds zero signal. It’s basically the Sagan quip, “They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.” BTC is more like some sort of asset class than a curre…

You're missing the most important part of the quip... But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses The dismissiveness is often a signal, that was his point. BTC has grown too far to be compared to Columbus setting out anyways, it's reached widespread access and accessibility, there are public companies devoted to it's access, BTC ETFs, etc. We've reached the…

I wasn't missing it - that part is implied by the meat of the bit I quoted.

The point is to keep in mind that just because people are laughing doesn't mean you're a genius, but people do also mock people doing great things.

Elon Musk is another easy example, look at the HN dismissal of Tesla and SpaceX over the years - even in the face of obvious massive success. You basically have to dismiss the naysayers and evaluate things for yourself.

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#304

Post by criddell »

agleason wrote: post #39
criddell wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will remain a very useful medium of exchange? Are you saying that today it is a very useful medium of exchange? Are you using it that way?

If I need to move money between countries, it certainly is by far the easiest. Traveling in India trying to get my friend money has been an awful headache. With cryptocurrency, it's quite simple

I actually might try this soon. I need to send my sister $20 in Canada. How can I make it super easy for my sister to receive the money?

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#305

Post by Ensorceled »

lostmsu wrote: post #282
Ensorceled wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are spending $$$ for pictures of anthropomorphic monkies and pizzas that are small variants of similar pictures; that's pretty irrational.

That is no different from expensive picture collectors. That's a minority of participants.

Expensive picture collectors may also be irrational ...

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#306

Post by twox2 »

micromacrofoot wrote: post #296
twox2 wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The NFT is the token, not the metadata. Of course there are projects with on chain metadata, and projects with on chain art as well. Also, many folks use IPFS pinning, so that does add some level of resilience as well, but yes not all NFTs are created equal.

most projects don't have on chain art or metadata, so the token is essentially a link to someone else's machine... if that machine goes away all you have is a token that represents something that no longer exists

Yep, I think we are in agreement. It's a buyer beware kind of thing for collectors of NFTs to do their own diligence if they care about these details. I do love the on chain projects though and the budding generative art scene. For example how Art Blocks keeps their code on chain... it's a very creative use of the medium.

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#307

Post by jcranmer »

delabay wrote: post #284
_xnmw wrote: post #202

For those who believe "crypto is too big to fail", or the genie is out of the bottle, or that crypto concepts have become so engrained and popular that it's not possible to stop, I'd like to point out that Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scam lasted for 30+ years. People built entire lives on his very professional-seeming "business". Scams can go on for a very long time, and very large numbers of people can build their whole l…

Crypto speaks to aspects of humanity which people hold near and dear. Crypto no doubt harbors shady characters, ponzi schemes, scams. You also can't deny that there are ideas which threaten state control, monetary policy, nationalistic ideals, religion its self. Just look at the magnitude of the conversation. Its easy to dismiss me as the ramblings of somebody caught up in the scam. But when has it been a good idea t…

The basic issue with cryptocurrency is that very little of it is actually new. You talk about ideas which threaten monetary policy--except those 'ideas' were actually the typical monetary policy not a hundred years ago. So it's worth asking yourself why monetary policy was changed from your favored position before trying to convince everybody else that it should be changed back.

You know, a decade ago, I actually thought that cryptocurrency and blockchain were interesting ideas that might be well worth pursuing. But it has increasingly felt like a solution in search of a problem--it's hard to find any use cases that aren't already better solved with other solutions. And in these kinds of discussions, the cryptocurrency adherents themselves struggle to proffer any such problem that doesn't boil down to--as someone else put it--wanting to live in Galt's Gulch. Which isn't exactly a compelling problem for most of the world's population. And comments like yours aren't helping to move the needle in the direction you want it to move.

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#308

Post by latexr »

tomp wrote: post #43
obayesshelton wrote: post #15

Crypto and NFT is one big ponzi scheme. Who on earth is spending $000,000s on a virtual ship? I sense it is a case of somebody close to the NFT or virtual world buying the asset and making out it is a great thing and then selling it on quickly. Many a scam involves somebody from the group buying something so the unwilling feel like it safe. As always, don't be left holding the baby.

How is spending $1 000 000 on a "virtual image" (NFT) any different than spending it on a Picasso? There are equivalent/superior copies of both readily available, but some people value provenance ...

> but some people value provenance...

Those people should stay away from NFTs, because theft is rampant[1].

> How is spending $1 000 000 on a "virtual image" (NFT) any different than spending it on a Picasso?

You own the Picasso but you don’t own the NFT image. Not in any way that matters. Your “ownership” of the virtual image via an NFT isn’t legally recognised and you have no rights to it. Especially not when the minter stole the image[1].

An NFT isn’t a virtual image, but a reference to it. Anyone else can download the same file for free and your purchase can be gone without recourse[2].

A more apt comparison would be spending $1,000,000 on a Picasso or a document that says you own the Moon.

[1]: https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7vxe7/people-are-stealing-a...

[2]: https://www.vice.com/en/article/pkdj79/peoples-expensive-nft...

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#309

Post by Daishiman »

delabay wrote: post #284
_xnmw wrote: post #202

For those who believe "crypto is too big to fail", or the genie is out of the bottle, or that crypto concepts have become so engrained and popular that it's not possible to stop, I'd like to point out that Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scam lasted for 30+ years. People built entire lives on his very professional-seeming "business". Scams can go on for a very long time, and very large numbers of people can build their whole l…

Crypto speaks to aspects of humanity which people hold near and dear. Crypto no doubt harbors shady characters, ponzi schemes, scams. You also can't deny that there are ideas which threaten state control, monetary policy, nationalistic ideals, religion its self. Just look at the magnitude of the conversation. Its easy to dismiss me as the ramblings of somebody caught up in the scam. But when has it been a good idea t…

But you're not being a skeptic here, you're just gambling.

Skepticism considers the ways in which you assumptions could have plausible positive or negative outcomes.

I see the entirety of the DeFi "industry" being regulated to death considering how many of these protocols and DAOs behave exactly like securities or replicate existing legal structures; I see no reason that governments will not seek to regulate them the same way.

We can look at the claims of crypt enthusiasts as stores of value, which is coherent, for sure, but if we're willing to give it the benefit of doubt then we should consider other equally shaky technologies and tech scenes, which doesn't give me much hope by itself.

The place where crypto has, and will likely continue to show value, is in money laundering and tax and currency control evasion. There are all things that, while illegal, _definitely_ have value, so my lower bound here is the value of a digital instrument to bypass these controls, especially in countries in which such things are tightly regulated.

That's not an insignificant lower bound; it is at least as large as a big fraction of the remittance industry + shadow banking. It's just that it's really, really difficult to make an honest living in this industry.

Re: The biggest crypto lending company is a ponzi scheme

#310

Post by gruez »

marcinjachymiak wrote: post #131
marcinjachymiak wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know what happens behind the scenes at Celsius. I do know there are many ways to get those high ROIs in DeFi. With zero evidence suggesting they are lying about returns, the charitable guess I can make is that they are getting high DeFi returns and giving their customers slightly lower ones after taking a cut.

There are also other ways to get these returns outside of DeFi, like by staking ETH, selling covered calls, or various other strategies on centralized services

>like by staking ETH

What's the ROI on staking ETH right now? Is it anywhere near the rate that they claim?

>selling covered calls

you're taking on risk when doing that. It works well until you get assigned, in which case you take a massive loss and unable to pay back your investors.

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